MAN BOOKER JUDGE, AUTHOR/BLOGGER LOUISE DOUGHTY HAS HER SAY ABOUT THAT LONGLIST

Booker: And the nominations aren't ...
The bigger the longlist is for the Booker prize, the greater the implied insult to the novels not included

So the Man Booker 2008 longlist is out, and speaking as a judge, I would like to say that it is, in my humble opinion, a mighty fine list: a fair spread of young and old authors, established and first-timers, and subject matter as various as Soviet Russia and contemporary Australia. Not to mention the writing styles: everything from the taut expediency of a thriller to the lush prose of Rushdie.
It has been a huge amount of work - I've read a novel a day for around three months and feel as though I have a large piece of blancmange where my brain should be - but it's a list of which I and my fellow judges are enormously proud.

Speaking as a novelist, though, there is one small cloud over my pleasure in the accomplishments of our chosen authors. Thirteen writers, along with their respective agents and publishers, will have been punching the air yesterday - perhaps even cracking open a premature bottle of something or other - but for each of those 13, there will be another 10 who knew or hoped they had been entered and will be drinking in far less celebratory mood.

It won't make any difference to them that the standard was incredibly high this year and no one should feel slighted by not having made the list. They won't care that there are at least six excluded novels that are weighing heavily on my conscience - if only there had been space for them. A miss is as good as a mile, after all: and a near miss worst of all. I know from personal experience how painful it is not to be longlisted.
For Louse Doughty's full essay link here.